The book provides a complete analysis of European bloodstock sales in 2024for all foals, yearlings and older horses in Britain, Ireland, France, Germany and Italy. It also includes foals and yearlings either foaled in Europe or by European-based sires at the major auctions in North America and Japan.

Furthermore, the Bloodstock Sales Review features comprehensive overviews of the trading year for Tattersalls, Goffs, Tattersalls Ireland and Arqana, as well as tables of the leading sires of 2024 by yearling average, lists of the year’s most expensive yearlings and foals, and a roll of top historical auction prices.

To mark the publication of the book, we compiled a top ten of the most profitable British and Irish-based yearling sires last year.

We have worked out each sires’ profitability index by dividing their 2024 yearling average by their covering fee of 2022, when the offspring in question were conceived.

In eighth place...

Night Of Thunder

2024 yearling ave: 271,929gns/€328,354

2022 covering fee: €75,000

Profitability index: 4.38

Night Of Thunder has dazzled the industry with high strike-rates of winners and stakes winners since his first two-year-old runners appeared on the track in 2019. He took another step forward last year when he was represented by Irish Champion Stakes hero Economics, unbeaten Fillies’ Mile winner Desert Flower and eye-catching Albany Stakes scorer Fairy Godmother.

Those results caused a bit of a bunfight for his yearlings, who were bred at Kildangan Stud at a fee of €75,000. His 66 lots who changed hands last year did so for an average of 271,929gns (€328,354), headed by a full-sister to unbeaten Group 3 winner Ombudsman bought by Sackville Donald from Ballyhimikin Stud for 900,000gns. It is unusual for a sire standing at that level of the market to return a profitability index that competes with much cheaper options.